Re: Feature request: Add --mtime option to git archive

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Feb 16, 2023, 22:21 UTC
Message-ID: <xmqq5yc1p7yn.fsf@gitster.g>
In-Reply-To: <Y+6akicTFG9n0eZy@coredump.intra.peff.net>

Jeff King <peff@peff.net> writes:

Show 9 quoted lines

> On Thu, Feb 16, 2023 at 12:41:42PM -0700, Raul E Rangel wrote:
>
>> When generating a tarball with `git archive <tree>`, `git archive` will
>> use the current time as the mtime. This results in a non-hermetic
>> tarball. Could we should add a --mtime option that allows passing in
>> the time? 
>
> That seems like a very reasonable feature to have. Just to sketch out
> the implementation, in case anybody wants to work on it: ...

There has been a discussion on not just "fix mtime" but coming up with a lot more stable tar archive format specification.

The first link is about documenting the status quo. The second one is about the proposed format that aims to be stable.

https://lore.kernel.org/git/20230203080629.31492-1-ray@ameretat.dev/ https://lore.kernel.org/git/20230205221728.4179674-2-sandals@crustytoothpaste.net/